Boardcollector Surf Swap

Neal Purchase's local knowledge

These days Neal Purchase is as famous for his own shaping as he is for spawning his creative off spring, musician / surfer / shaper Neal Purchase JrNeal is still shaping today, but back in the 70's and 80's he was crafting some fine shapes in Sydney at Keyo and carving deep channels on the gold coast with the likes of Steve ‘Zorro’ Goddard at Hot Stuff. Later he moved to Local Knowledge before doing his own label.It was while he was at 'LK' that he crafted this little Queensland tube shooter, shaped for the dredging tubes of the Gold Coast's point breaks.

I love the Superbank and while it is beautiful and mesmerizing to look at, the superbank hates me. I've broken my best boards there, been swept off the jump off rock (cutting me knee and knocking my fins out) and been dropped in on by Tom Carroll ( among many other nameless Gold Coast tradesmen/ local surf stars).But all is forgiven, even the 1000+ crowd, when you consider the goldy inspired the simple yet beautiful lines in this 6'5" single fly channel bottom rounded pin.

1982 Stubbies Surf Classic Burleigh

The 82 Stubbies was the pinicle of inovation period surfing and surfboard design. The heats included Mark Richards on his own hand shaped twin fin design, Cheyne Horan (winning) on a Geoff McCoy Laser Zap design with Ben Lexan designed winged Star fin, Rabbit Barthlemow on a channel bottom rounded pin tail Hot Stuff, Dane Kealoa on a T&C twin fin and Simon Anderson on his new 3 fin thruster design. Never before or since has there been such a variety of cutting edge surfboard design in one place.

Innovation Period - Definition

The innovation period of surfboard design has also been described as 'T2'. Meaning the second transition period, the first transition period of surfboard design was from late 60's to the early 70's, or short board revolution, where boards went from long boards (10') to short boards (6'), an exciting time for the likes of Dick Brewer and Bob Mc Tavish, who were sawing a foot off their boards at a time. The second transition period was from the late 70's to the early 80's when surf boards went from 1 fin to 3 fins and beyond.

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About Me

I've been collecting innovation period surf boards since 1990. I was trained as an industrial designer and I love surfboards as pieces of hydrodynamic design. I am an art lover and I appreciate surfboards as hand crafted sculptures and I admire their graphic designs and art works. Mainly I am a dedicated surfer and regularly surf each of the boards in my collection.